Was ‘Protective’ : Poindexter ‘Honorable,’ Reagan Says

President Reagan described former National Security Adviser John M. Poindexter Tuesday as “an honorable man” and said that in failing to report to the Oval Office the full details of the Iran- contra operation, “maybe he thought he was being, in some way, protective of me.”

The President said he was not worried about Poindexter’s impending testimony before the congressional committees investigating the Iran affair. And he asserted that he still has “no way of knowing why or how” profits from the sale of U.S. arms to Iran were secretly diverted to aid Nicaraguan rebels--the most damaging aspect of the scandal.

Reagan discussed the Iran-contra operation and a wide range of other topics in a 25-minute interview with a Times reporter and representatives of five other news organizations.

In the session, part of a White House effort to increase news media access to the President, Reagan sought to rebut growing criticism from some that the Administration may be on the brink of giving up too much in arms control negotiations with the Soviets.

He maintained that the talks with the Soviets are not about “a de-nuclearization of Europe” and stressed that he is proceeding cautiously.

Optimistic Speech

Although U.S. and Soviet officials have spoken optimistically about the possibility of an agreement to reduce intermediate-range nuclear weapons in Europe, he said, “you cannot proceed with (the total elimination of nuclear weapons) to the point that their conventional superiority is increased and leaves an imbalance.”

Echoing the concerns of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies, he said: “That would have to be taken into account, and that is . . . what we are talking about presently.”

On such current moral controversies as drug abuse on Wall Street, the Ivan Boesky insider trading scandal and adultery in television evangelical ministries, Reagan decried the spread of “a kind of cynicism abroad, particularly among our young people,” and said it is leading to an erosion of values throughout society.

“To teach what we’re teaching in schools today without any attention to morality or the right and wrong of things, this is absolutely wrong,” Reagan said, and it has far-ranging impact.

Sexual Abstinence

For example, he said, sexual abstinence must be stressed in the fight against the deadly AIDS epidemic. “How do you teach--start talking about sex to children and to young people without the moral side of that question being brought up? Just treat it like a physical thing such as eating a ham sandwich? And too much of this is going on.”

Reagan’s remarks about Poindexter represent one of the few times he has spoken in a public setting about the man who was his assistant for national security affairs during most of the Iran operation. Poindexter resigned from his position Nov. 25 when details of the affair were brought to light.

Although Poindexter conceivably could challenge Reagan’s public statements that he knew nothing of the fund diversion to the contras in the congressional hearings that begin next week, Reagan said he is confident that will not happen. “No, John Poindexter’s an honorable man,” he said.

He repeated his assertion that he had “no indication” of the fund diversion until details of the operation were reported to him by Atty. Gen. Edwin Meese III on Nov. 24. “I am still waiting to find out exactly how did there turn out to be more money and where did that money go,” Reagan said.

Asked how Poindexter could keep from him any word of the operation, Reagan said, Poindexter might have been trying to be “protective,” knowing the potential backlash from the operation. “I don’t know. But that’s what we’re continuing to investigate to find out.”

Possibility Questioned

He said he did not “see how” Poindexter and a deputy, Marine Lt. Col. Oliver L. North, who was dismissed Nov. 25, could have thought Reagan approved of a diversion of aid to the contras at the time U.S. assistance was banned.

“We don’t know . . . whether they even participated in that in any way or agreed to it,” Reagan said.

On arms control, Reagan said that even if efforts to remove medium-range missiles from Europe succeed, there still will be enough protection for the United States and its allies. “There are still thousands of warheads left in nuclear weapons on our part--airborne tactical-type weapons.

“So those are not part of this negotiation at all,” he said, in a reference to the shortest-range battlefield nuclear weapons.

Compliance a Key Issue

Reagan said that despite the encouragement Administration officials have gotten from the Soviet arms proposals, he had not relaxed his view that compliance with any treaty must be verifiable--a key point in the debate.

The Soviets’ recent show of cooperation “doesn’t mean that you’re going to roll over and just give in to something without protecting yourself,” he said.

Reagan expressed no irritation with remarks by former President Richard M. Nixon, former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger, and Edward L. Rowny, his arms control adviser, who said this week the United States should consider insisting on major changes in the nuclear arms reduction agreement being negotiated with Moscow.

“I expect diverse opinions in the shop and among the people and the Cabinet and everything else,” Reagan said. “I always know that there are some people who don’t give in. But I also know that once I’ve made the final decision, no matter how they may have felt about it, right or wrong, that they’ll carry it out.”

Reporters from The Times, the Baltimore Sun, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Knight-Ridder Newspapers and the Washington Times participated in the interview.